You remember in my last post I told the Root Hill types among you to watch your letterboxes for incoming DVDs?
I know for a fact that none of you will have got what you're watching for yet.
I swear it's not for lack of trying. I've printed all the address labels and everything, and I would dearly love to get the things in the post.
But can I get anybody to sell me fifteen DVD-box-size padded postpacks at anything like a sensible price? Yeah, right. Last year I got them in 3-packs from Tesco, which worked out at 33p per envelope. Fair enough. This year, Tesco have been out of stock for weeks (literally, weeks), while the post office only had half the number I needed, and were after £1.39 each for them! Combining that with the amount postage has gone up in the last 12 months, I could almost make a loss just on the post and packaging.
Still got one or two other ideas on where I might be able to try, but I haven't had a chance to try them yet.
So the long and short of it is that you can relax your letterbox-watching vigilance, because the DVDs haven't been posted. I am very, very sorry for the delay.
- The Colclough
Showing posts with label Snail Mail. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Snail Mail. Show all posts
Thursday, 7 February 2013
Tuesday, 4 January 2011
Ready to Burn
More good news for the Root Hill crowd: I've just finished engineering the DVD and designing the packaging. All that remains now is to burn the the data onto the discs, print the paper bits, and assemble the cases.
And of course, do battle with Royal Mail in a gallant effort to get the things into your letterboxes.
For those of you who bothered to order a copy (all 16 of you), here's a couple of sneak-preview pictures of what you can expect to receive soon so long as RM don't mess up and lose all my packages like they did last time I sent DVDs by post. For those who didn't, here's a tantalising glimpse of what you're missing out on this year (mind you, it's not too late to place an order)...
By the time I've got everything in the post, it'll be about 4-and-a-half months since RH 2010, although production time has been closer to 3-and-a-half, as I didn't even start editing until the beginning of October. Which all means I've done the job a lot faster than I did last time (the RH 2008 DVD took me 6 months). And the really nice bit is that I'm pretty sure I've done it better this time round. More / better achievement in less time. That feels good.
If / when your discs arrive, I'd be very interested to hear what you think of them - anything I should have done differently? Any bits that go on too long? Anything you wanted to see more of? (Apart from the Yorkshire Pizza of Death - that was censored for health-and-safety reasons. I didn't want to be running up psychiatrists' bills.)
8]
And finally, my stats...
- The Colclough
And of course, do battle with Royal Mail in a gallant effort to get the things into your letterboxes.
For those of you who bothered to order a copy (all 16 of you), here's a couple of sneak-preview pictures of what you can expect to receive soon so long as RM don't mess up and lose all my packages like they did last time I sent DVDs by post. For those who didn't, here's a tantalising glimpse of what you're missing out on this year (mind you, it's not too late to place an order)...
The front cover of the box...
...and the main menu
By the time I've got everything in the post, it'll be about 4-and-a-half months since RH 2010, although production time has been closer to 3-and-a-half, as I didn't even start editing until the beginning of October. Which all means I've done the job a lot faster than I did last time (the RH 2008 DVD took me 6 months). And the really nice bit is that I'm pretty sure I've done it better this time round. More / better achievement in less time. That feels good.
If / when your discs arrive, I'd be very interested to hear what you think of them - anything I should have done differently? Any bits that go on too long? Anything you wanted to see more of? (Apart from the Yorkshire Pizza of Death - that was censored for health-and-safety reasons. I didn't want to be running up psychiatrists' bills.)
8]
And finally, my stats...
- 11 For 11 status: 3 down, 8 to go - which means I'm currently winning by 1 post. *deranged cackle*
- Latest book read: The Runaway Train (first draft) by Hannah Newcombe
- Latest film/TV watched: Pixar: 25 Magic Moments
- Latest music listened to: The NeverEnding Story OST by Klaus Doldinger & Giorgio Moroder (1984)
- Latest food/sweets/whatever eaten: a yellow fruit pastille - preceded by other fruit pastilles!
- Programs and web pages currently running: Word 2007, Outlook 2007, Windows Explorer, Firefox (tabs: MatNav x2, Blogspot Create Post; hannahlikessheepbaa.blogspot.com)
- Webcomics posted today: Cylinder and Miserable #1119
- The Colclough
Thursday, 23 September 2010
Things and Stuff
No, I haven't made a conscious decision to blog only on Thursdays from now on. It's purely coincidental. I'm afraid the following is a rather disparate collection of mini-rants on totally unrelated subjects 8p
I've decided never to waste money on Recorded Delivery postage again. Royal Mail have had 9 working days to get the Megastropulodon DVDs to the cast, and one of them still hasn't turned up. Well, it hadn't last time I heard from the would-be recipient, which was on Tuesday evening. Considering that I paid £1.70 for first-class recorded delivery, I'm getting very cheesed off with RM.
I gave up the hair experiment on Monday. I got fed up with it being permenantly dirty, knotty and getting in my face, so I made use of some scissors. Other people have said they like the result, but I don't like it at all. I'm not showing you a photo. I've been considering wearing a hat for the next six months so I don't have to see the mess every time I walk past a mirror. I hate mirrors sometimes. I suspect there's a happy (ish) medium somewhere between what I had on Sunday and what I've got now, so I shall be avoiding scissors for quite a while now.
On a slightly more positive note, I've finally got round to booking my funny hat and my superhero cape for my graduation ceremony at the end of August.
Which leads me straight back to the negative side of things... now that I've finished college, I don't know what I want to do with my existence for the next few decades. It really feels like I've dropped off the end of something, and I'm sort of freefalling. I can't even knuckle down and work on a new animation, as my various script concepts are stubbornly remaining just that - concepts, and not much more. Anybody else got any ideas about what a super-powered granny might get up to?
The uncertainty is very depressing.
Um... what else to rant about...
Well, they say great artists steal, maybe that applies to bloggers too? I shall go and raid someone else's blog for inspiration... *goes and raids*
Hannah (whose fault it is that I started writing this blog in the first place... at least in part) has been complaining about finding it hard to express important things verbally, about the tendency to bottle things up, about unasked and unanswered questions (http://hannahlikessheepbaa.blogspot.com/2010/09/id-wear-my-heart-on-my-sleeve-but-its.html, http://hannahlikessheepbaa.blogspot.com/2010/09/me-and-my-heart-we-have-issues.html), and I'd have to say, some of it reads like a transcript of my own brain, because I don't talk about stuff either. I've been trying to think of something encouraging to say in reply, but nothing has come to mind yet, except to say you're not alone. There are aspects of me that nobody else knows about. Apart from God, of course - I guess that's omniscience for you. I suppose the first step towards being honest with other people is that we have to be honest with God first; after all there's no point trying to hide the truth from someone who already knows the truth anyway. Once we've got to grips with talking to God, then maybe it might start getting easier to talk to other humans. Or maybe I'm just barking up the wrong tree again. I don't know.
Anyway, I've probably ranted enough for the time being, so I'm going to hit the 'publish' button and get on with something else.
- The Colclough
I've decided never to waste money on Recorded Delivery postage again. Royal Mail have had 9 working days to get the Megastropulodon DVDs to the cast, and one of them still hasn't turned up. Well, it hadn't last time I heard from the would-be recipient, which was on Tuesday evening. Considering that I paid £1.70 for first-class recorded delivery, I'm getting very cheesed off with RM.
I gave up the hair experiment on Monday. I got fed up with it being permenantly dirty, knotty and getting in my face, so I made use of some scissors. Other people have said they like the result, but I don't like it at all. I'm not showing you a photo. I've been considering wearing a hat for the next six months so I don't have to see the mess every time I walk past a mirror. I hate mirrors sometimes. I suspect there's a happy (ish) medium somewhere between what I had on Sunday and what I've got now, so I shall be avoiding scissors for quite a while now.
On a slightly more positive note, I've finally got round to booking my funny hat and my superhero cape for my graduation ceremony at the end of August.
Which leads me straight back to the negative side of things... now that I've finished college, I don't know what I want to do with my existence for the next few decades. It really feels like I've dropped off the end of something, and I'm sort of freefalling. I can't even knuckle down and work on a new animation, as my various script concepts are stubbornly remaining just that - concepts, and not much more. Anybody else got any ideas about what a super-powered granny might get up to?
The uncertainty is very depressing.
Um... what else to rant about...
Well, they say great artists steal, maybe that applies to bloggers too? I shall go and raid someone else's blog for inspiration... *goes and raids*
Hannah (whose fault it is that I started writing this blog in the first place... at least in part) has been complaining about finding it hard to express important things verbally, about the tendency to bottle things up, about unasked and unanswered questions (http://hannahlikessheepbaa.blogspot.com/2010/09/id-wear-my-heart-on-my-sleeve-but-its.html, http://hannahlikessheepbaa.blogspot.com/2010/09/me-and-my-heart-we-have-issues.html), and I'd have to say, some of it reads like a transcript of my own brain, because I don't talk about stuff either. I've been trying to think of something encouraging to say in reply, but nothing has come to mind yet, except to say you're not alone. There are aspects of me that nobody else knows about. Apart from God, of course - I guess that's omniscience for you. I suppose the first step towards being honest with other people is that we have to be honest with God first; after all there's no point trying to hide the truth from someone who already knows the truth anyway. Once we've got to grips with talking to God, then maybe it might start getting easier to talk to other humans. Or maybe I'm just barking up the wrong tree again. I don't know.
Anyway, I've probably ranted enough for the time being, so I'm going to hit the 'publish' button and get on with something else.
- The Colclough
Thursday, 16 September 2010
All Those Shining Gigabytes
Be ye warned: the following blog post is computery. Except for the last paragraph, which is a mini-rant about the postal system.
***
The other day, I discovered that both of my hard disks were over 3/4 full.
Those of you who pay attention to your remaining HDD capacity will be familiar with the old sinking feeling that comes when you realise you're running out of space.
Well, today I went on a digital rampage through my second HDD, which is where I store most of my filmmaking and animation files. I stuffed three years' worth of animation source files into zip archives, and threw out more than 90 GB of old video, mostly uncompressed animation renders, and a few hours' worth of bad footage of me rambling at the camera. Don't worry, I've kept edited versions of the more interesting bits.
But suddenly, HDD 2 is more than half empty, and it'll be even emptier by the time I've finished transferring those zip archives to CDR and doing a few last bits of mucking out, which will probably have to wait until sometime next week, as I'm supposed to be building a summerhouse tomorrow (yes, in mid-September), and I'm away for the weekend.
And now that I'm rattling around inside a half-empty computer, I'm starting to wonder what to do with all the freshly-cleared space. I've had a nagging feeling for months that I should have started on another animation project by now, but I've been struggling to get a decent script together. I have too many fragmentary, half-baked ideas, and none that are ready to move ahead and start animating 8p
***
For anyone who was hoping this post might contain news of Megastropulodon: I'm just waiting until the actors have received their DVDs, and then I will post the film online. Two down, two to go. Considering that I sent the discs by first-class recorded delivery on Saturday, at a cost of £1.70 each (daylight robbery!), I'm a bit annoyed not to have had all four confirmed as received by now. Darn Royal Mail and their snail-impersonating ways. But don't worry, I haven't forgotten my promise to inflict the movie on the interwebs.
- The Colclough
***
The other day, I discovered that both of my hard disks were over 3/4 full.
Those of you who pay attention to your remaining HDD capacity will be familiar with the old sinking feeling that comes when you realise you're running out of space.
Well, today I went on a digital rampage through my second HDD, which is where I store most of my filmmaking and animation files. I stuffed three years' worth of animation source files into zip archives, and threw out more than 90 GB of old video, mostly uncompressed animation renders, and a few hours' worth of bad footage of me rambling at the camera. Don't worry, I've kept edited versions of the more interesting bits.
But suddenly, HDD 2 is more than half empty, and it'll be even emptier by the time I've finished transferring those zip archives to CDR and doing a few last bits of mucking out, which will probably have to wait until sometime next week, as I'm supposed to be building a summerhouse tomorrow (yes, in mid-September), and I'm away for the weekend.
And now that I'm rattling around inside a half-empty computer, I'm starting to wonder what to do with all the freshly-cleared space. I've had a nagging feeling for months that I should have started on another animation project by now, but I've been struggling to get a decent script together. I have too many fragmentary, half-baked ideas, and none that are ready to move ahead and start animating 8p
***
For anyone who was hoping this post might contain news of Megastropulodon: I'm just waiting until the actors have received their DVDs, and then I will post the film online. Two down, two to go. Considering that I sent the discs by first-class recorded delivery on Saturday, at a cost of £1.70 each (daylight robbery!), I'm a bit annoyed not to have had all four confirmed as received by now. Darn Royal Mail and their snail-impersonating ways. But don't worry, I haven't forgotten my promise to inflict the movie on the interwebs.
- The Colclough
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